UP lawmakers use stashed money as note-for-vote in advance

Two more leaders of other parties who would contest in Eastern UP also adopted similar modus operandi to make better use of their black money before it would turn `scrap’.

Some of the legislators who had stacked black money to use during coming assembly elections in UP found an innovative way to avoid their money turning into scrap following Prime Minister Narendra Modi’s demonetization of high denomination currency notes by distributing them among voters and asking them to exchange it when the bank opens.

This happened in Basti when a sitting ruling party legislator, who was recently dropped from the post of minister, used the black money for better use.

Sources said that a big section of political leaders was upset and see their `election fund’ turning `scrap’ after Modi’s decision. But some leaders have introduced innovations to neutralize Modi’s move. A prominent leader of Eastern UP town had made a unique move when he and his poll managers left for his constituency early Wednesday morning. Throughout Wednesday, they kept on distributing anything from Rs 5,000 to Rs 15,000 per family as an advance for `voting’ the leader in the coming elections.

“We collected this money for you but since Narendra Modi wanted that you should not benefit out of it, so we are handing the amount to you in advance”, the managers told the public after advising that that they can easily change it with new currency after the bank and post offices started to implement Modi’s decision from Thursday morning onwards.

Interestingly, the villagers, who were unhappy with Narendra Modi for having not fulfilled his promise of depositing Rs 15 lakh of black money into their account if his Party was voted to power in last Parliament elections, were finally happy with Modi’s Tuesday decision of putting a check on black money, make them rich at least by a few thousand rupees after the leader handed over them the money on Wednesday.

Two more leaders of other parties who would contest in Eastern UP also adopted similar modus operandi to make better use of their black money before it would turn `scrap’. After hearing the said move of above leaders, over a dozen other aspirants also packed their baggage and are ready to move into their respective constituencies to distribute the `black money’ so that villagers can get it changed from banks and will later vote for them in the coming elections.

Sources also maintained that the supremo of one another major political party, who said to have collected huge amount before giving party tickets, has also geared up to convert the old currency notes in the new one so the `collection’ will not turn into `scrap’. This leader had summoned most of the aspirants and handed them back their `contribution’ with a direction to get it changed with new currency notes and deposit it back with the party if they wanted to contest the polls. Now it would be a litmus test for the candidates to make that `black money’ into white and deposit it or to make fresh arrangements for the same to contest the polls.